


Always

by orphan_account



Category: Harry Potter (ish), NKOTB - Fandom
Genre: Angst, F/M, Loss, Love, what might have been
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:22:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24839878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Donnie is a performer, and, as such, he is able to appreciate a good performance.What about those rare times when a scene, a line, or even a single word, moves him so deeply, it causes him to reexamine his entire world?Fiction.I make no money from this work of fiction. I do not own any of J.K Rowling's characters. I also, unfortunately, do not own Donnie Wahlberg.
Kudos: 2





	Always

Donnie wasn't a Harry Potter fanatic, but he'd seen all of the movies. Normally, escaping into a fantasy world allowed him to experience a wide range of emotions while remaining detached from any real pain or risk.

There was one scene, however, which haunted Donnie - one which cut him to the core of his being. 

Too emotional to find the words, Snape summons his Patronus for Dumbledore, revealing it to be a doe, the same Patronus as that of his late beloved.

"Lily? After all this time?," Dumbledore asks, amazed.

Snape's single-word reply: "Always" - hit Donnie like a punch to the gut, every damn time.

The agony and defeat on Snape's face, his soul laid bare; the fear that his secret pain would become more widely known; the tone of his voice, the slump of his posture, the look in his eyes... Donnie had experienced something similar - not a death, but a loss: the one who got away, the one he could never forget (and, really, did he want to?). It was all fantasy on the screen, but for him, it was all too real.

He had a good life. He had a solid marriage. It would seem to the casual observer that Donnie Wahlberg had everything the world said was necessary for happiness.

Still, after all this time, if someone asked him whether he ever wondered about the one who got away, he knew what his honest answer would be. 

"Always."


End file.
